Berlin Fashion Week (BFW) seems to be destined for extremes. Where July’s edition arrived during the hottest week of the year, this season landed amid the freezing cold, with temperatures dropping to -10°C. Guests skidded between shows in platform heels and fur coats, navigating the snow and the ice with varying degrees of grace, but spirits were high and the front row remained tightly packed.
“For me, it’s important that you see the designers’ development season by season,” says Christiane Arp, chair of Fashion Council Germany, which organizes the week. “I judge [the growth] by looking at the people who are here from the industry that haven’t been before, and who keep coming back. Berlin is becoming more and more attractive for people to come, and that’s increasing season by season,” adds Fashion Council Germany CEO Scott Lipinski
The spotlight on Berlin grew this season with new formats to support both local and international designers.
Arp says the purpose of BFW is to offer discovery and new ideas on the international fashion stage. “Something isn’t working in our system — in our political situation, and in the industry,” she says. “Fashion is a language everyone understands, and to be part of something positive is so important for the times we live in.”
Here are five key takeaways from BFW Fall/Winter 2026.
BFW gained more international attention
BFW cemented its international influence this season — largely through Reference Studios’s Intervention showcase, which invites labels with global recognition to show on-schedule. The program has enriched the BFW calendar since its launch in February 2024, and has helped reposition Berlin as an international fashion platform rather than a local showcase. This season, newcomers included Japanese brand John Lawrence Sullivan, Nigerian designer Kenneth Ize, and skate-inspired streetwear brand Dagger, founded by Northern Irish designer Luke Rainey, who is now based in Berlin.
Menswear label GmbH continues to show on-schedule under Intervention, attracting the international fashion audience, and Ugandan brand Buzigahill returned to Intervention for the second time, after debuting last season. Now in its fifth season, Reference Studios CEO Mumi Haiati hopes the platform will continue hosting a handful of consistent brands season after season, while leaving space for newness.
“I think [BFW] is starting to have its own identity,” says Haiati, highlighting that it’s become easier to tap brands for its talent incubation and showcase platform. For Haiati, the best outcome would be if large German companies — like Hugo Boss, Adidas, Puma, and Bopla — were to invest in BFW in some way (as we see major labels investing in fashion councils in Paris and Milan). “I would love to see some of the big players support the city and create that halo effect.”
Brands pursued commercial growth
Many of BFW’s mainstay brands have expanded commercially since last season, through a combination of retail, wholesale, and new market access. Haderlump and Richert Beil each opened stores in Berlin, and SF1OG, which launched in 2019, is now expecting almost 50% sales growth for FW26, with wholesale (making up 40% of sales) growing steadily in the Asian market.
To support that momentum, the fashion council organized trips to South Korea and Japan at the end of last year, to put designers in contact with local buyers and press. “We try to put them in contact with the right buyers in the market for these brands,” says Lipinski. “You can only build those relationships on trust, it’s not like pushing a button and sales come,” adds Arp. Later this year, the fashion council plans to open a showroom in Paris.
Marke founder and creative director Mario Keine found the trip to Japan worthwhile, despite it taking place outside the normal ordering cycle. “It’s a huge investment to do the trip,” Keine says. “But I decided it’s worth it, especially to build trust and contact with buyers in Japan, because they like to see the brand two or three times before buying.”
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SF1OG co-founder and CEO Jacob Langemeyer also went on the trip, and introduced textured, wool plaid shirts made with a Japanese supplier he met during. “We have a lot of new partners [now], so the quality of the collections has increased a lot,” he says.
For Lagos-based brand Orange Culture, which returned to Berlin for FW26 after debuting last season, BFW has already translated to sales. “In Nigeria, people are used to color, so they’re more excited by the techniques. But in Berlin, people are so excited about the color and it feels very new,” says Adebayo Oke-Lawal, the brand’s founder, creative director and CEO. Local clients have since become repeat customers, wearing pieces to this season’s show. “I think it feels very different compared to what they’re used to in Berlin, so they like to mix it in with their Berlin clothes.”
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New formats on the calendar
New formats broadened BFW beyond the runway. Reference Studios partnered with Tedx to host a series of conversational fireside chats, featuring speakers such as design veteran Edward Buchanan, the duo behind GmbH, and Obo agency founder and managing partner René Célestin, who has produced Victoria’s Secret fashion shows (2006-2017) and the Paris 2024 Olympics. Reference Studios also launched experiential pop-up Doofer Street Market (a Dover Street Market parody that CEO Mumi Haiati says is “classic Berlin humor”) in partnership with Berlin-based creative collective Live From Earth, featuring street culture exhibitions and performances from DJs including Brutalismus 3000 and Horsegiirl.
Haiati wants BFW to be a multidisciplinary platform, open to a variety of audiences. “I think the value [of having different formats at BFW] is to show the multitude of aesthetics and design or art practices — it’s important to show all these different realities,” he says. “Berlin has historically always been rebellious and political, the city has gone through so much, so I think that’s something that can be reflected in all these different voices.”
Exhibition “Der Berliner Salon” continued this season, dedicated to showcasing young talent (including students), as did “Raum Berlin” (which showcases brands that aren’t doing runway collections). “It’s important for us to have different formats to make clear how we work,” says Arp. “We have designers here who show it is possible to go your own way and define what success means yourself, so we don’t push them into a specific direction — particularly as we all have our doubts in the industry about whether the system is still working.” All formats are born out of conversations with brands, says Lipinski. “We see what they want to do, and we provide a platform for that,” he adds.
Trends to note
Designers experimented with shirting and intricate details for FW26, to subvert typical shirting. John Lawrence Sullivan presented sharp tailoring with mesh chainmail layers, or elbow-length leather gloves, inspired by Norwegian metal culture. Marke’s show — a highlight for many — featured ties made out of shirt sleeves, which represents “strangulation by capitalism”, says Keine. “It’s about losing individuality during a time of conformity.”
Kasia Kucharska returned to the runway after a maternity break last season, with modular shirts that tied around the body. Her collection was inspired by her experience of motherhood. “I love to wear shirts myself, but it’s a garment you need time to put on — and as a mum I don’t have the time. So in this collection, we have skirts wrapped around the hips and shirts you can open quickly. Everything is very modular,” she said backstage after the show.
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Balletshofer balanced tailoring with sportswear, focusing on construction that molds to the body. There were details such as jackets and pants made to look intentionally creased, and a collarless blazer with a seam at the waist to give subtle definition. “From the outside, it looks clean and wearable, but the complexity is in the details,” says founder and creative director Alan Balletshofer.
Beading and fringing were present, as we’ve seen in Paris and Milan in recent seasons. Kucharska created beads from her signature latex, Buzigahill’s collection featured fringe draped over the shoulders of blazers, and Orange Culture featured skirts and blouses made from fringed materials in burnt orange and emerald green, which swished as the models walked.
Designers comment on privacy, identity and political tensions
Berlin brands tend not to shy away from political and social commentary. But designers didn’t create spectacles around these themes, as we’ve seen previously. “They’re living it,” says Arp. In Germany, in particular, debates over immigration and rising support for the far right mean the certain freedoms that once defined Berlin no longer feel guaranteed.
Fashion Council Germany describes BFW as the “responsible movement of freedom, inclusion and creativity”. “These values are why people move to Berlin — the sense of freedom in the city,” says Lipinski. “They are the major themes of our society, and they’re really part of our brands’ DNA,” adds Arp. “Can you see them in our country all the time, is everything going in the right direction? No. So we have to protect this idea of freedom, inclusion, diversity, so people feel safe in a country that is also in trouble.”
This value is recognized by the Berlin Senate, who funds the event. At the opening dinner on Friday evening, Mayor Franziska Giffey said in her speech: “Fashion has the power to bring people together, to make a difference. Fashion can sell an idea of a future every season, but it can also provide an idea of the present.”
Designers explored privacy, identity, and visibility in the social media age. Marke’s collection was inspired by unease over online hatred and misinformation, despite unprecedented access to knowledge. Keine compared the present moment to the shift from Rococo excess to post-revolutionary uniformity, playing with notions of masculinity across both eras. Balletshofer presented a film that follows four characters exploring their self-image. “The idea was to confront the idea of a routine, which can become a comfort zone but also a prison. We wanted to think about who a person is when you strip away all their accomplishments — how you’d describe yourself outside of those things — and [what it reveals] about each character’s insecurities,” Balletshofer says.
Andrej Gronau imagined the home as a doll house, where identity is negotiated, with plush belts and ’60s interior palettes set to a soundtrack of squeaking doors and dial-up tones. “The idea was bringing the domestic interior into the wardrobe. With rising costs at the moment and shrinking public spaces, people are gathering at home,” the designer said backstage. “We were thinking of the doll house — not as a toy, but as a system where you gather and dress up.”
GmbH’s collection of exaggerated fur collars, thigh high latex boots and scarves and neck ties that draped to the floor was titled Döppleganger, referencing history repeating itself. The design duo was inspired by music and club references from Berlin in the 1980s, “when we felt free and lived in a city that represented our values”, said co-founder Serhat Isik backstage.
If any city knows how to reinvent itself after a period of social or political crisis, it’s Berlin. But Haiati believes the spirit of the city could also help fashion reinvent itself after a period of slow consumption and retail fatigue. “I see Berlin almost like a research and development laboratory,” Haiati says. “I see a huge opportunity for BFW to stand for newness and creativity, and to become part of the solution, because we have the possibility to reinvent.”
